For individuals recuperating from leg injuries or surgeries, exercise is a crucial element of the healing process. Leg surgery patients, or leg-injured individuals, often cannot move their legs in certain ways or positions due to pain stiffness, swelling, trauma and diminished neural control.
Various leg exercise devices do exist for leg surgery patients. U.S. Pat. No. 3,749,400 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,229,001, for example, disclose leg exercise devices comprising an adjustable element that rides on a horizontal track, such that a patient laying or sitting up in bed can push the adjustable element away with this foot or feet, thereby extending his leg or legs, and then bring the element back, thereby bending his leg or legs. Though these references provide a horizontal or lateral exercise that works out certain leg muscles, such as the quadriceps, these references do not provide a vertical or up-down exercise that works other important leg muscles, such as the hamstrings. Further, these references require that the patient have the ability to hold up his leg in a certain position, which is not possible for some leg surgery patients.
Moreover, U.S. Pat. No. 5,303,716 and U.S. Pat. Pub. No. 2005/0119095 disclose leg exercise devices comprising a platform that rises above the patient and a suspension system that suspends the patient's leg or legs, such that a patient laying or sitting up in bed can attempt to push his suspended leg or legs upwards or downwards. Although these references provide a vertical or up-down exercise that works out certain leg muscles, they do not teach a horizontal or lateral exercise that works out other important leg muscles, such as the quadriceps.
Therefore, a need exists to overcome the problems with the prior art as discussed above, and particularly for a leg exercise device for leg surgery or leg injury recuperation patients that provides an overall work out for the entire patient's leg or legs while requiring a minimal amount of control of the leg by the patient.